Uses for Old Garage Doors and Openers

There are many things you can do to recycle old garage doors and garage door openers, so instead of throwing it all away in the dumpster, recycle and find creative ways to reuse those old garage door parts!

Practical Uses for Old Garage Door Parts

There are many practical ways to use old garage doors by recycling their materials. If you are looking for framing material, vinyl and fiberglass works quite well. You can build garden frames and composting bins with these materials, making them virtually free.

If you have an old wooden garage door, you can use that wood to build anything! Small fixes to fences, tree houses, or garden layouts are all valuable for home improvement.

You can also take a garage door opener and turn it into a mini elevator for groceries or small items. This could be helpful for elderly people living at home. They would no longer need to lug heavy things up and down stairs, making their life a bit easier. Go about 7:30 into this video to learn more about turning your old garage door opener into a dumbwaiter.

Personal Entertainment Uses for Old Garage Door Parts

Imagine having a huge retractable projection screen for the next football or baseball game. Hook up your old garage door opener to a projector screen and at the press of a button have a movie theater drop down from the ceiling.

Keep with the raising/dropping theme, and rig the access panel to your attic to open and close automatically. This smart dad had a pool table, but wanted a ping pong table too. Instead of having two large tables take up space, he engineered this Ping Pong Table Topper with spare parts from old garage doors. The ultimate man cave!

While it may seem like overkill, last I checked this is America, and we are free to turn our old garage door openers in giant can crushers whenever we did like:

Our last ideas will help keep Halloween scary for the kids in your neighborhood. Use your old garage door system to rig up a scary flying ghost. It can swoop out of trees with the press of a button! You can also use an old garage door opener for practical jokes as shown in this old Canadian TV show (start 3:25 in):

With a bit of creativity, you can make many useful things from old garage door and garage openers. You will save time, money, and feel proud knowing you recycled parts instead of simply dumping.